In Locospect
In Locospect is a short story that acts as a prequel to Flashback. It is written as a first-person monologue by an unnamed Chronopath Custodis struggling with his powers who, lacking ties to the world through a Custodian-Guide and having already lost his family to the Titan, fears Whiro will attempt to claim him as a Black Angel. Transcript Time. Time is a funny thing. Mortal beings perceive it as a linear progression. One end to another. Birth to death. Cradle to the grave. Neither anything before, nor anything hence. A beginning and an end, only stories to tell of what else might once have been. That is not so for an immortal. Coming to terms with their newfound immortality is a gruelling process that all Custodis must endure at one time or another, be it upon the death of their loved ones, the death of their world or the death of their fellows. The lucky ones don’t have to endure it until they have already come to terms with their power. I was not one of the lucky ones. My unfortunate suffering was only exacerbated by the complex and incredible nature of my abilities, for I am that one out of a million legion Custodis that can bend the very fabric of time. Chronopathy is the rarest of abilities simply because it is so dangerous. The more powerful a Chronopath gets, the more dangerous their powers become. Eventually such power might drive them mad, lead them to attempt to perform feats of warp-magic that only a Titan can withstand. As such, Chronopaths are amongst the most desirable of targets for the Mad God. Whiro chooses his target with the greatest of care; of highest priority are those whose powers are of use to him, those who find difficulty controlling them, and those with few ties to the world around them. I have the unfortunate position of being all three. I live in fear of the day that the Mad God might come for me. My family is no more, for he killed them. My world is no more, for he killed it. I am the last Custodis here and my Custodian-Guide is buried deep beneath the surface of a world part-way between that which is material and that which is not. Knowing that which I do now, I know I could go back in time and save them. I also know that doing so would risk upsetting the delicate balance between the world and the warp, creating a maelstrom that would tear both asunder. A warp storm such as that is the most powerful force in nature’s arsenal, capable of rending even a mighty titan to fragments of ideas floating like dust on the wind. If such a storm were to be created it could rip apart the world, spreading to others like wildfire and devouring whole systems in its wake. If such a storm were not created, the Mad God would surely claim me as his own. I imagine the tone of these rambling writings profess my greatest fear to be that black-winged leviathan which floats patiently above me, waiting for my composure to crack such that he might swoop bodily upon me and carry me away screaming, borne on taloned claws across mountain ranges to the dark pits of despair towards which even the most imaginative mind dare not stray for fear of returning forever changed – if indeed it returned at all. No, for the thing I fear most is my own mind. I have been given more cause to doubt my own sanity of late than ever I thought I could; my wife and child are no more, yet through these great and terrible powers I can see every moment of the future we could never have played simultaneously before the life I am doomed to lead. I see every moment we had together, and from behind my eyelids I watch it burn to ashes beneath that evil black shadow. Mortal beings perceive time as a linear progression. One end to another. Birth to death. Cradle to the grave. Neither anything before, nor anything hence. A beginning and an end, only stories to tell of what else might once have been. Most immortals perceive it as a scale with no end, from the moment of their creation to beyond the day the universe shall collapse back into the warp. I have no such luxury. I see everything. I see the yawning black abyss that awaits all beings, but know I am doomed never to reach the relief of its final embrace. I see the bright dawn of existence, but I know beneath its beauty that such an event created every horror I see before me. I see every moment of every possibility, into the dark hearts of men and the Machiavellian machinations of gods. The warp has laid itself bare to me, and has torn me open before itself. I see everything, and yet nothing. The winged shadow draws nearer. Link In Locospect Category:Short Stories